Miami: Elderly man dies from hypothermia

second recovering

January 12, 2010|By Rachel Hatzipanagos, Sun Sentinel

MIAMI Two elderly men struggled with hypothermia as they lay on the floor of their apartment barely clothed and without access to food or water.

One man, Wilfredo Arreyes, 77, died one day after Miami-Dade authorities rescued him and his 93-year-old roommate Miguel Aleman from their apartment on the 1000 block of Northwest Second Street in Miami.

Aleman is recovering at Jackson Memorial Hospital.

"The hypothermia set in and slowed the body down to the point where they couldn't move," said Ignatius Carroll, spokesman for the fire department. "They were struggling to survive in freezing temperatures."

Temperatures in Miami dropped to the 30s over the weekend, some of the coldest temperatures the city has seen since 1927. According to authorities, no heating system was found in the apartment and the men were only wearing pajamas.

A caretaker that usually looks after the men was away for the weekend and had called the apartment to check up on them. When there was no answer, the caretaker called authorities, who arrived at the apartment on Monday afternoon, Carroll said.

Firefighters used tools to break through the iron bars on the windows of the apartment, making their way in and finding the two men laying on the floor, each in their own bedrooms, authorities said.

The Arreyes was unconscious and the Aleman was barely able to speak. Both had signs of frostbite on their fingers and feet.

"We removed them from the apartment and took them to the truck to warm them up," Carroll said. "Talking to the neighbors, we believe the men had been there since Friday without any food or water."

This is the second case of cold-weather related reported in this past week's cold snap. In Broward County, the body of a homeless man was found near Hollywood's Young Circle on Jan 4. Investigators believed that the weather was to blame.